A Book Of Quaker Saints Part 37

A fiercer contest was now brewing, no longer between two handfuls of Colonists but between the inhabitants of two great Continents. For it was just before the outbreak of the Revolutionary War of 1775. The part of the country in which Easton Towns.h.i.+p was situated was already distressed by visits of scouting parties from both British and American armies, and the American Government, unable to protect the inhabitants, had issued a proclamation directing them to leave the country. This was the reason that all the scattered houses in the neighbourhood were deserted, save only the few tenanted by the handful of Friends.

'You did well, Friends,' the speaker continued, 'well to ask to be permitted to exercise your own judgment without blame to the authorities, well to say to them in all courtesy and charity, "You are clear of us in that you have warned us"--and to stay on in your dwellings and to carry out your accustomed work. The report of this your courage and faith hath reached us in our abiding place at East Hoosack, and the Lord hath charged me to come on foot through the wilderness country these thirty miles, to meet with you to-day, and to bear to you these two messages from Him, "The Beloved of the Lord shall dwell in safety by Him," and "He shall cover thee with His feathers all the day long."'

The visitor sat down again in his seat. The furrowed line of anxiety in old Zebulon Hoxie's high forehead smoothed itself away; the eyes of one or two of the younger women Friends filled with tears. As the speaker's voice ceased, little Susannah Hoxie's head, which had been drooping lower and lower, finally found a resting-place, and was encircled by her mother's arm. Young Mrs. Hoxie drew off her small daughter's shady hat, and put it on the seat beside her, while she very gently stroked back the golden curls from the child's high forehead. In doing this she caught a rebuking glance from her elder daughter, Dinah.

'Naughty, naughty Susie, to go to sleep in Meeting,' Dinah was thinking; 'it is very hot, and _I_ am sleepy too, but _I_ don't go to sleep. I do wish a b.u.t.terfly would come in at the window just for once--or a bird, a little bird with blue, and red, and pink, and yellow feathers. I liked what that stranger Friend said about being 'covered with feathers all the day long.' I wish I was all covered with feathers like a little bird. I wish there were feathers in Meeting, or anywhere close outside.' She turned in her corner seat and looked through the slit in the wall--why there were feathers close outside the wall of the house, red, and yellow, and blue, and pink!

What could they be? Very gently Dinah moved her head, so that her eye came closer to the slit. But, when she looked again, the feathers had mysteriously disappeared--nothing was to be seen now but a slight trembling of the tree branches in the wilderness woods at a little distance.

In the mean while her brother, Benjamin Hoxie, on the other low seat opposite the window, was also thinking of the stranger's sermon. 'He said it was a valiant thing to do, to stop on here when all the neighbours have left. I didn't know Friends could do valiant things. I thought only soldiers were valiant. But if a scouting party really did come--if those English scouts suddenly appeared, then even a Quaker boy might have a chance to show that he is not necessarily a coward because he does not fight.' Benjamin's eyes strayed also out of the open window. It was very hot and still in the Meeting-house. Yet the bushes certainly were trembling. How strange that there should be a breeze there and not here! 'Thou shall not be afraid for the arrow that flieth by day,' he thought to himself. 'Well, there are no arrows in this part of the country any longer, now that they say all the Indians have left. I wonder, if I saw an English gun pointing at me out of those bushes, should I be afraid?'

But it was gentle Mrs. Hoxie, with her arm still round her baby daughter, who kept the stranger's words longest in her heart. 'Shall dwell in safety by Him,--the Beloved of the Lord,' she repeated to herself over and over again, 'yet my husband hath feared for me, and we have both been very fearful for the children. Truly, we have known the terror by night these last weeks in these unsettled times, even though our duty was plainly to stay here. Why were we so fearful? we of little faith. "The Beloved of the Lord shall dwell in safety by Him. He shall cover him with His feathers all the day long."'

And then, in her turn, Mrs. Hoxie looked up, as her little daughter had done, and saw the same three tall feathers creeping above the sill of the open Meeting-house window frame. For just one moment her heart, that usually beat so calmly under her grey Quaker robe, seemed to stand absolutely still. She went white to the lips. Then 'shall dwell in safety by Him,' the words flashed back to her mind. She looked across to where her husband sat--an urgent look. He met her eyes, read them, and followed the direction in which she gazed. Then he, too, saw the feathers--three, five, seven, nine, sticking up in a row. Another instant, and a dark-skinned face, an evil face, appeared beneath them, looking over the sill. The moment most to be dreaded in the lives of all American settlers--more terrible than any visit from civilised soldiers--had come suddenly upon the little company of Friends alone here in the wilderness. An Indian Chief was staring in at their Meeting-house window, showing his teeth in a cruel grin. In his hand he held a sheaf of arrows, poisoned arrows, only too ready to fly, and kill, by day.

All the a.s.sembled Friends were aware of his presence by this time, and were watching the window now, though not one of them moved. Mrs. Hoxie glanced towards her other little daughter, and saw to her great relief that Dinah too had fallen asleep, her head against the wooden wall.

Dinah and Susie were the two youngest children in Meeting that morning. The others were mostly older even than Benjamin, who was twelve. They were, therefore, far too well-trained in Quaker stillness to move, for any Indians, until the Friends at the head of the Meeting should have shaken hands and given the signal to disperse.

Nevertheless, the hearts of even the elder girls were beating very fast. Benjamin's lips were tightly shut, and with eyes that were unusually bright he followed every movement of the Indian Chief, who, as it seemed in one bound and without making the slightest noise, had moved round to the open doorway.

There he stood, the naked brown figure, in full war-paint and feathers, looking with piercing eyes at each man Friend in turn, as if one of them must have the weapons that he sought. But the Friends were entirely unarmed. There was not a gun, or a rifle, or a sword to be found in any of their dwelling-houses, so there could not be any in their peaceful Meeting.

A minute later, a dozen other Redskins, equally terrible, stood beside the Chief, and the bushes in the distance were quite still. The bushes trembled no longer. It was Benjamin who found it hard not to tremble now, as he saw thirteen sharp arrows taken from their quivers by thirteen skinny brown hands, and their notches held taut to thirteen bow-strings, all ready to shoot. Yet still the Friends sat on, without stirring, in complete silence.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIERCE FEATHERS]

Only Benjamin, turning his head to look at his grandfather, saw Zebulon Hoxie, the patriarch of the Meeting, gazing full at the Chief, who had first approached. The Indian's flas.h.i.+ng eyes, under the matted black eyebrows, gazed back fiercely beneath his narrow red forehead into the Quaker's calm blue eyes beneath the high white brow and snowy hair. No word was spoken, but in silence two powers were measured against one another--the power of hate, and the power of love. For steady friendliness to his strange visitors was written in every line of Zebulon Hoxie's face.

The children never knew how long that steadfast gaze lasted. But at length, to Benjamin's utter astonishment, for some unknown reason the Indian's eyes fell. His head, that he had carried high and haughtily, sank towards his breast. He glanced round the Meeting-house three times with a scrutiny that nothing could escape. Then, signing to his followers, the thirteen arrows were noiselessly replaced in thirteen quivers, the thirteen bows were laid down and rested against the wall; many footsteps, lighter than falling snow, crossed the floor; the Indian Chief, unarmed, sat himself down in the nearest seat, with his followers in all their war-paint, but also unarmed, close round him.

The Meeting did not stop. The Meeting continued--one of the strangest Friends' Meetings, surely, that ever was held. The Meeting not only continued, it increased in solemnity and in power.

Never, while they lived, did any of those present that day forget that silent Meeting, or the brooding Presence, that, closer, clearer than the sunlight, filled the bright room.

'Cover thee with His feathers all the day long.'

The Friends sat in their accustomed stillness. But the Indians sat more still than any of them. They seemed strangely at home in the silence, these wild men of the woods. Motionless they sat, as a group of trees on a windless day, or as a tranquil pool unstirred by the smallest breeze; silent, as if they were themselves a part of Nature's own silence rather than of the family of her unquiet, human children.

The slow minutes slipped past. The peace brooded, and grew, and deepened. 'Am I dreaming?' Mrs. Hoxie thought to herself more than once, and then, raising her eyes, she saw the Indians still in the same place, and knew it was no dream. She saw, too, that Benjamin's eyes were riveted to some objects hanging from the strangers' waists, that none of the other Friends appeared to see.

At last, when the accustomed hour of wors.h.i.+p was ended, the two Friends at the head of the Meeting shook hands solemnly. Then, and not till then, did old Zebulon Hoxie advance to the Indian Chief, and with signs he invited him and his followers to come to his house close at hand. With signs they accepted. The strange procession crossed the sunlit path. Susie and Dinah, wide awake now, but kept silent in obedience to their mother's whispers, were watching the feathers with clear, untroubled eyes that knew no fear. Only Benjamin s.h.i.+vered as if he were cold.

When the company had arrived at the house, Zebulon put bread and cheese on the table, and invited his unwonted guests to help themselves. They did so, thanking him with signs, as they knew little or no English. Robert Nisbet, the visiting Friend, who could speak and understand French, had a conversation with one of the Indians in that language, and this was what he said: 'We surrounded your house, meaning to destroy every living person within it. But when we saw you sitting with your door open, and _without weapons of defence_, we had no wish any longer to hurt you. Now, we would fight for you, and defend you ourselves from all who wish you ill.' Meanwhile the Chief who had entered first was speaking in broken English to old Zebulon Hoxie, gesticulating to make his meaning clear.

'Indian come White Man House,' he said, pointing with his finger towards the Settlement, 'Indian want kill white man, one, two, three, six, all!' and he clutched the tomahawk at his belt with a gruesome gesture. 'Indian come, see White Man sit in house; no gun, no arrow, no knife; all quiet, all still, wors.h.i.+pping Great Spirit. Great Spirit inside Indian too;' he pointed to his breast; 'then Great Spirit say: "Indian! No kill them!"' With these words, the Chief took a white feather from one of his arrows, and stuck it firmly over the centre of the roof in a peculiar way. 'With that white feather above your house,' the French-speaking Indian said to Robert Nisbet, 'your settlement is safe. We Indians are your friends henceforward, and you are ours.'

A moment later and the strange guests had all disappeared as noiselessly as they had come. But, when the bushes had ceased to tremble, Benjamin stole to his mother's side. 'Mother, did you _see_, did you _see_?' he whispered. 'They were _not_ friendly Indians. They were the very most savage kind. Did you,' he shuddered, 'did you, and father, and grandfather, and the others not notice what those things were, hanging from their waists? They were _scalps_--scalps of men and women that those Indians had killed,' and again he shuddered.

His mother stooped and kissed him. 'Yea, my son,' she answered, 'I did see. In truth we all saw, too well, save only the tender maids, thy sisters, who know naught of terror or wrong. But thou, my son, when thou dost remember those human scalps, pray for the slayers and for the slain. Only for thyself and for us, have no fear. Remember, rather, the blessing of that other Benjamin, for whom I named thee.

"The Beloved of the Lord shall dwell in safety by Him. He shall cover him all the day long."'

x.x.x. THE THIEF IN THE TANYARD

_'In the House of Love men do not curse nor swear; they do not destroy nor kill any. They use no outward swords or spears. They seek to to destroy no flesh of man; but it is a fight of the cross and patience to the subduing of sin.'--HENRY NICHOLAS (circa 1540)_.

_'We have to keep in mind the thought of Christ. To us it seems most important to stop the evil act, hold it down by force, or push off its consequences on to someone else: anything, so long as we get rid of them from ourselves.

Christ's thought was to change the evil mind, whatever physical consequences action, directed to this end, might involve.... This is the essence of "turning the other cheek," it is the att.i.tude most likely to convert the sinner who injures us, whether it actually does so or not,--we cannot force him to be converted.'

... 'Those who try this method of love for the sake of the evildoer must be prepared to go down, if necessary, as the front ranks storming a strong position go down, paying the price of victory for those who come after them.

This method is not certain to conquer the evil mind: it is the most likely way to do it, and it is that that matters most.'--A.

NEAVE BRAYSHAW._

x.x.x. THE THIEF IN THE TANYARD

Knock! knock! knock!

The tremulous sound, three times repeated, disturbed the stillness of an empty street of small wooden houses. The night was very dark, but the square ma.s.s of the tanner's house could just be discerned, black and solid against the sky. The rays of a solitary oil lamp straggled faintly across the roadway, and showed a man with a large bundle on his back standing on the doorstep of that house, knocking as if he were afraid of the noise he made.

Knock! knock! knock! He tried once more, but with growing timidity and hesitation. Evidently the inmates of the house were busy, or too far off to hear the feeble summons. No one answered. The man's small stock of courage seemed exhausted. Giving his heavy bundle a hitch back on to his shoulder, he slunk off down the road, to where at a little distance the small oil lamp high up on the wall beckoned faintly in the darkness. The all-pervading smell of a tannery close by filled the air.

When he came directly under the lamp, the man stopped. The light, falling directly upon the package he carried, showed it to be a bundle of hides all ready for tanning. Here he stopped, and drew out a piece of crumpled newspaper from his pocket. Smoothing out the creases as carefully as he could, he held it up towards the lamp, and read once more the strange words that he already knew almost by heart.

This notice was printed in large letters in the advertis.e.m.e.nt column: 'WHOEVER stole a lot of hides on the fifth day of the present month is HEREBY informed that their owner has a sincere wish to be his friend. If poverty tempted him to this false step the owner will keep the whole transaction secret, and will gladly put him in the way of obtaining money by means more likely to bring him peace of mind.'

'If poverty tempted him to this false step,' the man repeated to himself half aloud. 'Tanner Savery wraps up his meaning in fine words, but their sense is plain enough. If it was being poor that drove a man to become a thief and to steal these hides from the shadow of that dark archway down by the river last Sunday night,--suppose it was poverty, well what then? Friend Savery "will gladly put him in the way of obtaining money by means more likely to bring him peace of mind."

Will he indeed? Can I trust him? Is it a hoax? I would rather do without the money now, if only I could get rid of these hides, and of their smell, that sticks to a man's nostrils even as sin does to his memory. But the tanner promises to give me back peace of mind, does he? Well, that's a fair offer and worth some risk. I'll knock once more at his door and see what happens.'

Stuffing the newspaper into his pocket he walked quickly up the road again, back to the square house, and up the sanded steps. Again he lifted the bra.s.s knocker, and again 'knock! knock! knock!' rang out on the night air. But this time the knocking was less tremulous, and as it happened the inmates of the house were crossing the hall on their way to bed and heard the sound at once. In less than a minute the door opened, and a square bra.s.s candlestick, held high up, threw its light out into the street. The candlestick was held by a tall man with greyish white hair, whom all the town knew as Tanner Savery. Peeping behind his shoulder appeared his wife's gentle face, surmounted by the clear muslin of a Quakeress's cap. The man on the doorstep never lifted up his eyes to the couple. 'I've brought them back, Mr.

Savery,' he mumbled, too much ashamed even to explain what he meant by 'them.' But William Savery needed no explanation. Ever since the hides had mysteriously disappeared from his tanyard a few days before, he had felt sure that this quarrelsome neighbour of his must have taken them.

What was that neighbour's real name? That, n.o.body knows, or ever will know now. We only know that whatever it may have been it certainly was not John Smith, because when, in after years, Tanner Savery occasionally told this story he always called the stealer of his hides 'John Smith' in order to disguise his ident.i.ty; so we will speak of John Smith too. 'A ne'er-do-well' was the character people gave him.

They spoke of him as a man who was his own worst enemy, sadly too fond of his gla.s.s, and always quarrelling with his neighbours. Only William Savery refused to believe that any man could be altogether evil, and he kept a ray of hope in his heart for John Smith, even when his valuable bundle of hides mysteriously disappeared. It was that ray of hope that had made him put the advertis.e.m.e.nt in the paper, though he knew it would set the town laughing over 'those Quakers and their queer soft ways.' This evening the ray of hope was s.h.i.+ning more brightly than ever. More brightly even than the candlelight shone in the darkness of the night, the hope in his heart shone through the brightness of the Tanner's eyes and smile. Yet he only answered cheerily, 'All right, friend, wait till I can light a lantern and go to the barn to take them back with thee.'

There was no trace of surprise in his voice. Those matter-of-fact tones sounded as if it were the most natural thing in the world to go out to the tanyard at 10 o'clock at night instead of going upstairs to bed.

'After we have done that,' he continued, 'perhaps thou wilt come in and tell me how this happened; we will see what can be done for thee.'

A lantern, hanging on its hook in the hall, was soon lighted. The two men picked their way down the sanded steps again, then pa.s.sing under a high creeper-covered gateway they followed a narrow, flagged path to the tanyard.

All this time William Savery had not said one word to his wife--but the ring of happiness in his voice had made her happy too, and had told her what he would like her to do during his absence from the house. Lifting up the bedroom candlestick from the oak chest on which her husband had set it down, she hastened to the larder, then to the kitchen, where she poked up the fire into a bright glow, put a kettle on, and then went back again through the hall to the parlour, to and fro several times. When the two men returned to the house a quarter of an hour later, the fragrance of hot coffee greeted them. Solid pies and meat were spread out on the dark oak table. Mrs. Savery's pies were famous throughout the town. But besides pies there were cakes, buns, bread, and fruit,--a meal, indeed, to tempt any hungry man.